Meteors players start their WBBL season

Hayden Lenord

See where twelve of our ACT Meteors players will be playing this season in WBBL|04

As the Women’s National Cricket League (WNCL) takes a break for the summer, twelve of our shining Abode Hotels ACT Meteors will be starting their Rebel Women’s Big Bash League campaign tomorrow with a festival-style opening weekend at CitiPower centre in Melbourne.

The ACT Meteors players will be split across four teams including Sydney Thunder, Melbourne Renegades, Sydney Sixers and Melbourne Stars. This gives the players a great opportunity to diversify their skills in T20 cricket as opposed to the one-day format they play currently in WNCL.

Among the players signed to WBBL teams is Zoe Cooke, adding to her fairytale return to elite cricket with the former Western District-UC fast bowler making a return to the Meteors this season.

Zoe only found out about her contract with the Melbourne Renegades a week before needing to fly down to Melbourne for the first training session. She makes mention to the support of the other ACT Meteors players in the Renegades and the support they have given her.

“We have got a lot of the girls already down there, so there will be five Meteors in the Renegades, so I’m pretty excited to just be around them and have people I know down there,” says Cooke.

“The girls have been really good so far just giving tips and hints on what to bring, and how to prepare for it and what to expect down there, it will be good to have them there.”

Zoe Cooke will be sharing the Melbourne Renegades red and black with Maitlan Brown who will be back for her third season in the WBBL. Maitlin sees the opportunities available to get some games under her belt during the break in WNCL, even if they are playing in T20 format. She is also keen to see the flurry of ACT players in Melbourne.

“It is pretty much ACT in Melbourne this year, minus three players, so it will be really nice to have some familiar faces in the team,” says Maitlan.

“We have a really good team culture at the Renegades and I know the ACT girls will slot right in, so it should be really fun.”

Brown enjoys playing for the Renegades and hopes her efforts with the ball this season could potentially place her in the eyes of the selectors of the Australian side again. The twenty-year-old is no stranger to the Australian selectors, having represented Australia previously in the Australia A squad against India and the inaugural Women’s National Performance Squad.

Zoe Cooke is looking forward to adding the experience of her first season in the WBBL and to learn new skills through the team at the Melbourne Renegades.

“It’s a really good competition down there, I hope to pick up experience from being around the squad. We’ve got quite a few international players and it should be fun,” says Cooke.

To catch all the scores for this weekend’s games in the WBBL click here